Hanging on: Coyote Rock Gym navigating COVID attendance restrictions

Coyote Rock Gym was Ottawa’s first rock climbing gym when it first opened in 1992, but it is in a tenuous position like the rest of the climbing industry.

Jody Miall is the co-owner of the Coyote Rock Gym. He has been in the climbing industry since 1993 and first started climbing in 1989. His gym had never been closed for more than three days since its opening, until the March shutdown.

“I have never looked at the rock climbing gym with such uncertainty before,” said Miall. “We don’t run on 80 per cent margins or 50 per cent margins. We run on 15 per cent margins. If we don’t have the gym busy at peak times, we are slowly dying.”

The rock gym reopened in mid-July. Right now, Coyote is averaging roughly 30 to 40 per cent of the climbers compared to what they would see under normal circumstances.

The gym can have a max of 50 people and is functioning based on online appointment booking for two-hour climbing time slots. There are five two-hour spots starting at 11 am and running until 11 pm.

The evening slots have done well but the morning and early afternoon climbing times have been next to empty thus far, according to Miall. Most of the gym’s members come to climb after work in the evening and there are only 50 spots available per day during those times.

Coyote was averaging between 280 and 320 climbers a day before COVID.

“I’m sure over the next couple of weeks it will start to fill-up a little bit more now that we are open. It’s funny because everyone has been congratulating us for being open. It’s felt like we have been out at sea for the last three months and we finally got on the beach and there is no food or water. It’s a little bit scary.”

Rock climbing gyms are in a difficult position for establishing and maintaining current safety measures, even more so than traditional gyms and fitness centres. As a result, Coyote has instituted a policy that climbers must wears masks at all times when inside the gym. Members must sanitize before and after climbs, including as soon as they get in the gym. There is also no access to changerooms or lockers.

“When you’re at a gym, generally people don’t shoot off a treadmill and roll six feet to the right or fall off of a squat rack or a dumbbell [rack]. You know, where climbing is quite dynamic,” said Miall. “You can land and roll and compromise yours and someone else’s ability to maintain social distancing. So we thought the masks were a good additional precaution.”

Miall looked at the safety precautions of other gyms and leaned on the expertise of his wife Laura, a former practicing nurse, in developing their own safety plan. They published their reopening plan online and Miall say the overall response has been overwhelmingly positive.

“We didn’t want to do the bare minimum of what the Ontario and the national standard are. We tried to go a little bit of a step above just because we thought it was the right thing to do,” said Miall. “We don’t want to take any risks. The last thing we need is to have an outbreak at our gym and get shutdown again. That would be absolutely catastrophic for us.”

Miall is also the co-owner of North of 7 Distillery, which is located in the same building as Coyote Rock Gym. The distillery went from making whiskey, vodka, gin, and rum to hand sanitizer and a high alcohol content liquid chalk that is required for all climbers at the gym. It is made with 80 per cent ethyl alcohol to help sanitize climbers' hands while also providing grip for climbing.

“In the initial rush before the bottom dropped out of the sanitizer market, that covered rent on the gym side for a couple of months and kept us alive.”

A significant number of members are coming in and opting out of the remaining months of their memberships however, according to Miall.

“It got pretty emotional the first day we were open and like 10 people came in and let those four months go on their membership. It felt really good,” said Miall. “It’s also a strange spot [to be in]. We have been so self-sufficient forever and now it’s like we are relying on people’s charity to keep us alive. It’s so nice that people want to do it but also feels terrible for someone who been running a pretty successful business for almost three decades.”

The next few months could see programming and memberships restructured, including Coyotes’ popular youth programming. Prices will likely have to increase given the limits to how many climbers can safely attend the gym according to Miall.

If people are weary about climbing, Miall welcomes them to check out the gym and get a feel for its safety prior to reactivating their memberships. He says the gym has never been cleaner or more open.

“Come check it out,” said Miall. “It’s heaven [for a climber]. You could not ask for a better time as far as climbing conditions go.”

Coyote Rock Gym is located at St. Laurent Blvd. and Innes Rd. at the back of the industrial park. Interested climbers can book appointments on the Coyote Rock Gym website.